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The World of Georic 1989-Present

Saturday, September 16, 2023

Masks of Nyarlathotep Campaign 10th Anniversary

My old brain is getting feebler by the day, but thanks to social media "memories" I'm reminded that things happened far longer ago than I recollect.

This weekend is the 10th Anniversary of our first session of Masks of Nyarlathotep.   Disregard the actual posting date for the actual play recap, things were much slower in the 2010's. 

This book looks completely different now, but the cover and binding are still intact.

It wasn't the first session of the overall Call of Cthulhu campaign.  The 1920's campaign already had twenty sessions under its belt, spanning from the Northeast to Georgia to the Dakota Badlands all the way to Europe, with a ensemble of interesting characters.  

I had sprinkled in Jackson Elias' name and connections to the investigators as early as episode nine, but their world stopped when they got the fateful telegraph: 

I had one death (a German pilot from the Great War - lost both hands on a Cult of the Bloody Tongue crit), but they got enough clues to start on the journey.  

Years later, when we completed the campaign, and the end of the world was strongly dodged, I tallied up the results.

MASKS OF NYARLATHOTEP – STATISTICS
Distance travelled: 28,362 miles

Three Years Actual Time
17  sessions

Cultists confirmed killed:
  • 5 Cult of the Bloody Tongue (New York)
  • 10 Brotherhood of the Black Pharaoh (London)
  • 10 Brotherhood of the Black Pharaoh (Egypt)
  • @100 Cult of the Bloody Tongue (Kenya)
  • 10-15 Cult of the Bloated Woman Technicians (Gray Dragon Island)
  • 65 New China Army Soldiers sacrificed to the greater good.
Cultists killed by lion:  3

Innocents directly killed: 75
Innocents indirectly killed by Imperial Japanese Navy, on intelligence from the Investigators: 25,000
Sailors of the Imperial Japanese Navy Killed:  25
Marines of the Imperial Japanese Navy Killed: 32

Africans clubbed by Investigators:  12
Wilderness Guides Killed: 2
Wilderness Guides that Survived: 1
Sikh Knife-Fighters Killed With Self-Inflicted Wounds: 1
Mythos beasts encountered:
  • 1 Serpent Person
  • 1 Thing in the Fog
  • 3 Miscellaneous lesser gods
  • 1 Elder Thing
  • 2 Hounds of Tindalos
  • 2 Fire Vampires
  • 1 Dark Young
  • 1 Spawn of Nylarathotep
  • 5 Deep Ones (and lots of carcasses)
  • 1 Shoggoth
Cars Crashed: 1
Motorcycles Crashed: 1
Boats stolen: 2
Buildings blown up: 1
Rooftop Chases: 1
Brothel roofs crashed through: 1
Grenades Used: 37

Hospital visits: 6
Deportations: 6

Black Market Weapons Obtained by Wintermute:  14

Skills Improved to 90% or more: 3 

Steamships overhauled by O'Hara: 2

Appearances by an eight-foot tall orange Asian man: 2

Human Brains Eaten: 1

Characters who jumped off a moving train:  2
  • Steven O'Hara
  • Francois Guerin
Characters killed: 6
  •  Heinrich Hans, ex-German Flying Ace  (blood loss from getting his hands chopped off in Jackson's hotel room)  Episode 1
  • Anthony Parks, Miskatonic Grad Assistant (destroyed by a summoned Elder Thing in the Egyptian desert)  Episode 28
  • Yaleshia, Belly Dancer  (destroyed by a summoned Elder Thing in the Egyptian desert) Episode 28
  • Abdul, Egyptian Thug (disintegrated by the Black Pharaoh), 31
  • Father Dorian Dolan, Anglican Priest (eaten by a shoggoth, Gray Dragon Island), Episode 37
  • Francois Guerin, ex-French Foreign Legion (sacrificed by his own friends "for the good of humanity") Episode 37
Characters driven mad: 1
  • Brian Nichols, driven mad by the paintings in Miles Shipley's house.  Still wandering the streets of Soho in the rain.
Characters' minds wiped: 1
  • Randall Ward, by the mysterious man in the fez at Misr House, Episode #26
Characters who mysteriously disappeared
  • RJ Cunninghame, Big Game Hunter, Episode 37
Characters transported to Ancient Egypt(?):  1
  • Dr Nathaniel Millheim (by the Black Pharaoh)
Characters sodomized by summoned lesser gods
  • Joshua Wenisko (London)
Characters Surviving
  • Steven O'Hara - Mathematician and Physics Doctoral Candidate - full campaign.
  • Dr Bob Wintermute - Professor of History, Miskatonic Univeristy - full campaign.
  • David Kavida - Writer, The New Yorker - four sessions.
On day, if/when life slows down, we'll gather the troops and after a session or three of catching up "Six Months Later," I'll launch another epic storyline.

Of course, 11 years ago, owlbears and skeletons were line-dancing outside the princess' palace.  Both are fantastic memories.


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